My son hadnt called in three months. I convinced myself he was just busy at work. In the end, I decided to visit unannounced. When I rang his doorbell, a stranger opened the door and told me shed been living there for half a year.
If I hadnt got on that bus to Manchester that day, I might have kept lying to myself for months, telling myself that William simply didnt have time.
That it was work, some big project, that young people are busy living their fast lives and forgetting to call their mums. But I did go, and what I discovered at the front door to his flat turned my world upside down.
It began so innocuously. He used to call on Sundays, just after lunch, when I was tidying up from my roast and he had his morning tea. Every so often in the week, hed send a text asking after my blood pressure, whether Id seen the doctor, or if dear Mrs. Jenkins downstairs was still making a racket. Just ordinary things. After George died, those calls became my lifeline. The only thing left to hang onto.
Sixty-one years old, four years a widow, thirty-two years spent working in the Land Registry office and then suddenly retired, an empty flat, and silence filled only by that single Sunday phone call.
In May, William stopped ringing.
At first, I wasnt too worried. The first week I thought, he simply forgot. I sent a text. He replied, shortly: Swamped with work, will call soon. He didnt. The second week another text. All fine, mum, well chat soon. The third nothing at all. I called, no answer. Hed text back hours later, barely a word, as if someone else was replying for him.
My friend Janet, who goes to Pilates with me at the community centre, was blunt:
Margaret, go and see him. Somethings wrong.
Maybe hes got a girlfriend and doesnt want to say, I defended him more to myself than to Janet.
Then he should definitely call, she shrugged.
But I hesitated. William never did like surprises. Even when George was alive, and we once turned up to see him without warning, he looked as though wed caught him in the act when really, hed just left some washing up in the sink. Thats just how he was cherished his own space. I understood. Or at least, I thought I did.
By August, I couldnt stand it. I bought a ticket for the coach from Bristol to Manchester, three hours journey. I took a jar of my homemade apricot jam and a tin of baked cheesecake because William adored my cheesecake since his schooldays. All the way there, I rehearsed what I would say: that I missed him, that he didnt have to call daily, but once a week isnt too much, that I was still his mum, not a burden.
I arrived at his building around three oclock. Third floor, door on the right, brown doormat with Welcome stitched on, the one Id bought him as a housewarming gift.
But the doormat was gone.
A plain grey mat lay in its place. I knocked. A young woman answered maybe thirty, dark bobbed hair, tracksuit and mug of tea in hand.
Afternoon, Im looking for William Parker, I said, as calmly as I could.
She narrowed her eyes.
Theres no William here. Ive lived here for six months.
I stood there, cheesecake tin in my bag and jam jar in hand, unable to speak. The woman Emily, she later told me let me in, probably because I looked like I might faint.
The flat looked different. Furniture, curtains, even the walls all changed. Nothing as I remembered. No sign of my son.
Emily said she was renting through an agency. She didnt know the landlord, all was arranged through a letting agent. She gave me the number. I phoned at once, right there on her sofa the very place where William had sat six months ago.
The agent confirmed William Parker let out his flat in February. No, he hadnt left a forwarding address. But yes, he paid his rent like clockwork, straight from his British account.
I got the last coach back to Bristol. I didnt cry. I was too stunned. My son my only child, the one who held my hand at Georges funeral, who helped with my council tax forms, who always said, Mum, you can rely on me had moved out, rented his flat to a stranger, and never said a word.
For three days, I waited. Hoping hed call. He didnt.
On the fourth day, I texted: I was in Manchester. I know youre not on Alexandra Road. Call me.
He rang within the hour. For the first time in months, I heard his voice for real and not in a voicemail message.
Mum, I Im sorry. I should have told you.
Where are you?
Silence. Long and heavy.
In Edinburgh. Since March.
I sat down at the kitchen table. Out the window, the neighbour was hanging washing on her balcony. The world carried on, while mine seemed to fall apart.
William talked a long while. After dad died, hed felt trapped. My calls, my questions about his pressure, my cakes by post he said it all felt suffocating. He didnt know how to tell me, afraid it would break my heart. So hed taken the worst possible way out hed run away.
I felt like if I didnt leave, I was going to suffocate, he said softly. Not because of you, mum, but because I felt I had to fill in for dad, to fill this gaping hole.
I wanted to yell. I wanted to say, I never asked that of him. But when I closed my eyes and was honest, I saw all my Sunday phone calls, all the stories about every doctors visit, every bill, as if he were my husband, not my son.
I didnt say any of that aloud. Maybe I wasnt ready.
Come back for Christmas, I managed.
I will, Mum.
Once I hung up, I sat in that kitchen for a long time. The cheesecake meant for Manchester was still on the counter. I cut a slice for myself. It was good. It always was.
William came home for Christmas. He sat at the table across from me in Georges old chair, but not to replace him. As a grown man, whod done something hurtful, but not without reason. We didnt speak of Edinburgh over the mince pies. Perhaps one day we will. Perhaps we wont.
Janet sometimes asks if Ive forgiven him. Im not sure how to answer. All I know is, now when he rings on Sundays and he does, reliably I try to keep my stories short. I ask about him more, talk about myself less. Its only a small step. But you have to begin somewhere.
Sometimes, the greatest act of love a mother can give her grown child is to let them go. Even if she was never taught how.
